Poetics of fading. Renewal and development of alternative photographic reproduction techniques of a non-permanent nature

The alternative processes of analogue photography, those non-standard techniques that date back more than a century, are once again being revived by virtual communities and the easy access to information that the internet allows. Within these methods, there is a series of techniques that enables us to obtain images of a non-permanent nature, that is, in which the photograph gradually disappears. This research aims to find the reasons why artists and photographers decide to work with these ephemeral processes.

The article will focus on four non-permanent techniques: anthotype, chlorophyll prints, yeastograms and lumen printing. These will be used as a basis for exploring the motivation behind these techniques that involve planning and the use of excessively long time periods to obtain an image that will gradually fade.

The need to think about the immediacy of the image, the search for a changing plastic work closely related to the performative, the full control over an eco-friendly process that justifies a profile linking artistic practices with science and the search for new plastic aesthetics that result in a single copy, are the main axes that this paper analyses in order to contextualize the current uses of ephemeral photographic processes.